Harrods has turned itself into The Land of Make Believe for Christmas. And TBWA\London has created the ad to go with that.

Peter Souter, chairman of TBWA\London, commented, “Winning Harrods has been a fairy tale for TBWA. So it’s kind of appropriate that our first campaign for them is also a fairy tale… well, mouse tale. The animation is a beautiful, nostalgic take on the store’s traditions. The Harrods Christmas displays are a London icon, and this year’s will be more thrilling than ever.”

The commercial, nearly two minutes of stop-motion animation, is called Christmas Tail. It’s a fairy-tale about a tiny mouse called Peter Pumpernickel, who wants to help Father Christmas. It will run on Harrods’ website, social media platforms, and in-store from 7th November. It is also running in cinemas nationwide.

How much attention to detail (read, money) went into the ad?

The spot, produced by A+C Studios, combines handcrafted and original stop-motion techniques with experimental ideas and design. The sets were made from illustrated artwork, which was then constructed in 3D in the studio. The 2D backgrounds are intended to give the animation a real storybook feel, as if the illustrations had come straight off the pages of the Christmas story.

The stop-motion animation process took 28 days to complete before going on to the in-house digital team, who created the visual effects as well as removing rigs and blue screens.

Miles Kempton at GCSR (Grand Central Recording Studios) created the sound design for the film:

“This was an absolute delight to work on and the finished result sparkles with festive cheer and magic. My first aim was to accentuate the story and narrative by characterising and voicing Peter Pumpernickel the mouse/hero of the story with some signature sounds in order to bring life to his personality. I voiced the various scenes myself in the booth using pitching plugins later when editing. The group shots were voiced by the producer and creatives.

“All other sound effects were created to enhance what the animation was doing. I created figurines using Blu-Tack to record the footsteps on various different surfaces. For the gift scenes, we bought candy canes and gift-wrapped random objects in the studio to record the presents. Sleigh bells, harps and bell tree sfx were added to the lovely music score to enhance certain scenes like the opening of the fairytale book, and the arrival of Santa Claus (GC’s own Oscar) to name a few. The end scene was created by recording a few lightbulb pings and sampling them to create the lights turning on.  Working with Marcus, Jason and Malika was a pleasure and it was a great piece to mix. We are all very proud of the final result.”

The campaign will tie in with the store’s world famous Christmas traditions – the Harrods Christmas Grotto and The Festival of Christmas.

Creative credits:

Creative agency: TBWA\London

Creative directors: Jason Fletcher & Marcus Iles

Chairman & chief creative officer: Peter Souter

Production Company: A+C Studios

Post Production: A+C Studios, The Mill, Unit Post

Audio Post Production: Miles Kempton at GCRS

Music Publisher: Deep East Music Ltd

Music Supervisor: Marcus Brooke-Smith at Platinum Rye